Downloading Flash Video


Although this technique actually has nothing to do with PowerPoint, it is often the case that the downloaded movie is played during a PowerPoint lesson. There are many advantages to downloading movies and playing them from the computer rather than linking to them at YouTube, TeacherTube or similar. Often these online resources are blocked at school or network access to them is unreliable. The movies will also play faster/smoother from a computer rather than online and the advertisements/comments on the page can be avoided as well.

In some situations teachers will have to download the movies at home and then bring them on a "thumb drive" to school to use.

Here's an easy way to download video from sites like YouTube, TeacherTube, etc.

Setup
  1. Download and install the Firefox browser (if not already installed)
  2. Start Firefox and access "Tools" > "Add-ons"
  3. Choose "Get Add-Ons" and search for DownloadHelper
  4. Locate and install "Video DownloadHelper". Restart Firefox.
  5. Download and install the VLC software to play movies (including ".flv" versions)

Now to download a movie
  1. Use the Firefox browser to access the movie online.
  2. Click on the right side of the "spinning balls" Download Helper button on the toolbar. Choose to download the video with the highest (best resolution) number. Save the movie.

That's it!

Now you can link to that movie from a PowerPoint slide and play it during a presentation.


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